Access
This article is part of Nature's premium content.
Published online 10 December 2004 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news041206-14
News
Monkeys miss out on music
Cotton-top tamarins show no preference for harmonious tones.
Is appreciation of music a uniquely human trait, or does any animal with decent hearing prefer pleasant combinations of notes? Cognitive scientists have discovered that tamarin monkeys have no taste for the consonant tones that mostly make up music, suggesting that musicality may be restricted to humans alone.
Consonant tones are combinations of sound waves whose wavelengths are simple multiples of each other.
To read this story in full you will need to login or make a payment (see right).
Comments
Reader comments are usually moderated after posting. If you find something offensive or inappropriate, you can speed this process by clicking 'Report this comment' (or, if that doesn't work for you, email redesign@nature.com). For more controversial topics, we reserve the right to moderate before comments are published.